


Sadness Appreciation Society Prompts

by ponticle



Series: Ponticle's Collected Shorts [3]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types
Genre: Abuse, Act III, Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Circle of Magi, Desperation, F/M, Imprisonment, M/M, Mages and Templars, Medical Procedures, Templars, Unrequited Love, Wrongful Imprisonment, ongoing, prompts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-16
Updated: 2017-10-24
Packaged: 2018-12-15 23:01:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 1,764
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11815995
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ponticle/pseuds/ponticle
Summary: Prompt Fills: under 500 words. Now defunct, but I still like these.





	1. Pieces of You [Alistair x Anders]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: watching the one you love with someone else

* * *

[Alistair x Anders, Modern AU] 

* * *

 

 

He comes home at two in the morning. It’s par for the course lately. The fighting has escalated... _again_.

“Anders?” calls Alistair. “Is that you?”

Anders makes a non-committal sound; it gurgles up from his throat. His footsteps sound wrong too.

Alistair stands, throws on a shirt, and pads out into the hallway. When he sees Anders, he stops dead between their bedrooms.

“Fuck… _Anders_ …” Heat spreads across his chest. He crosses the carpet in three long steps and winds his arm around Anders’ back. “What did he do to you?”

_...this time._

Anders shakes his head and shrugs. It’s no kind of an answer, but they both know what it means.

Alistair sits Anders on the couch and runs to the kitchen to find his first aid kit. There’s a gash above his left eye that’s bleeding onto his eyebrow. His lip is split.

_When will it be enough? When he kills you?_

But Alistair doesn’t say that. Anders doesn’t need a lecture; he needs _help_. So he swallows every angry, jealous, sickened word and dabs the cut above his eye. Their faces are just a few inches apart. He can see the subtle lines around his eyes that belie what he’s been through—what he’s _still_ going through. They look deeper now than usual.

Once the blood is washed away, the gash gapes. It’s bigger than he thought. And although he’s done this a thousand times, his hands shake when he sutures it. It’s hard to work when he’s so invested… with this level of _feeling_ attached… with this mixture of indignation and outrage _and love_.

The love is the most confusing. Because here he is, stitching up his oldest friend in the world, trying not to sob and stab him in the eye, while Anders blames himself for whatever insane thing he’s supposedly done to deserve this. It’s the _saddest_ kind of rejection.

But _because_ he loves him, Alistair ties the knot, gives him an ice pack, and stays up with him all night. Because, honestly, watching over him is better than _nothing_ … and it’s the only piece of him Alistair can have.

* * *

 


	2. A Small Lie [Alistair x Anders]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> During Act III. This is a true drabble: 100 words.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sometimes a small lie... even one word... can mean a lot.

* * *

[A familiar shock of hair. The memory of a smirk.]

 

Anders bristles. “Weren’t you a Grey Warden once?”

“That’s the rumor,” he laughs. “Wait. Weren’t you?”

The set of his jaw is so convincing. Has Anders been forgotten?

 

[Slick skin and sweat-soaked sheets. Candles and firelight. Late nights and earlier mornings.]

 

“...that’s the rumor…”

 

[A journal full of unsent letters. A decade of strife and heartache and war. An ocean in between.]

 

Anders retracts into Hawke’s shadow--that was a different life. Now they overcorrect with vacuous humor and meaningless words.

 

“So... did you know him?” asks Hawke later.

“ _No_.” 

* * *

 


	3. Promises [Anders x Karl]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: use 'but you promised' as a line of dialogue.

* * *

“ _But you promised you’d let him go_ ,” someone whimpers. “ _I did everything you asked me to_.”

 

Anders hears the yelling, but does not look up from his book. It’s not his concern; he has to stay out of it. He’s gotten involved too many times already.

 

“ _Please_ ,” the person begs. “ _I can do more_!”

 

Anders shivers and closes his eyes.

 _Just keep reading. Keep your head down_.

Normally, he would be blazing down the circuitous hallways already. He knows _exactly_ where those voices are coming from: one floor down, last door on the left. The Templars call it _the bunker_ because the room has no windows and only one small door. It’s completely defensible, but Anders knows he could blow the frame apart if he tried… he wouldn’t make it much past that, but maybe it would be _enough_ … maybe he could take down one or two of those bastards before they caught him.

...but… he has something to _lose_ now. Just like the person begging for leniency, he has someone for whom he’d make deals, someone for whom he’d trade _anything_ , someone who makes his miserable life almost _tolerable_.

So he stays seated, swallows the bile that threatens to choke him, and thinks his name: _Karl_.

* * *

 


	4. Crying [Alistair x Warden]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: crying in another room, 185 words

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This didn't turn out exactly like I planned, but I like it anyway. I got the idea from something I edited for Aurlana. She's great. :)

* * *

In some other room, in some other universe, Alistair is crying. He’s sobbing hard enough that his breath comes in bursts and his lip quivers. He’s mourning her loss. He’s grieving his lineage. He’s cursing the universe.

...but not _here_.

In _this_ universe, he’s accepting responsibility. The crown _will_ fit on his head, even if the ring on his left finger never does. He _agreed_ —that’s all there is to it.

So when she comes to his room, there’s only one thing he can do, regardless of the _other_ him in the _other_ room.

“We need to end this,” he says. It’s like someone else is saying it. A person with different beliefs and different experiences takes over his body; he’s powerless to intervene.

He watches her eyes fill with tears.

“Honestly, what did you _think_ would happen?” he asks. It’s sharper than he intends. _Is this who he is now_?

She shakes her head. No words. No answers.

“ _You’re_ the one who did this,” he argues.

She glares.

“I’m _sorry_ ,” he says… but he doesn’t know if he’s sorry for her or for himself.

* * *

 


	5. Unrequited [Anders x Hawke]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: unrequited love.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to Aurlana for assist and for the prompt itself. :)

* * *

It takes Anders a while to recognize the ache for what it is. It takes him a while to _admit_ what he’s feeling. It takes him a while to come to terms with what he’s been trying to deny all these years. 

 _It’s love_.

Unfortunately, it’s _not_ the kind of love that every schoolchild is taught to believe in. It’s not the kind that will naturally lead to warm embraces and walks on the harbor. It’s not the kind that ends in a quiet life... marriage and children.

It’s the kind of love that could get one of them killed.

So he ignores it—the ulcerative pit in his stomach and lancinating pain in his chest. Instead, he stands at Hawke’s flank every day, watching in horror as he runs headlong into danger every chance he gets… always ready with the right spell to counteract the damage. He soothes every wound and erases every scar. Hawke is brave and reckless and incorrigible. _Perfect._ Some days, Anders even finds it in himself to smile or laugh.

But there is no scenario where he’ll let himself be transparent because of something he learned long ago—when his life was reduced to the space between curved stone walls and stolen moments among stacks of mildew-ridden books. Loving someone means _protecting_ ; loving someone means _preserving_ ; loving someone means _self-sacrifice_. And ultimately, Anders has no agency to do anything but love Hawke. So he’ll protect, preserve, and sacrifice… the only way he knows how:

He’ll never admit the _truth_.

* * *

 


	6. Happiness? [Alistair x Anders]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: The Silent Treatment.
> 
> This fits into my larger work, [The Affair](http://archiveofourown.org/works/7212661). What can I say? I missed it and I'm sentimental. _shhhh_. Therefore, it's written in the same style: Alistair's POV, first person retrospective.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I also broke the 500 word rule. Sue me.

* * *

In the early years of our relationship, when we weren’t dealing with external turmoil, Anders used to say this _thing_ to me that I’ll never forget: ‘I just want you to be _happy_.’ It was accompanied by a fair amount of exasperation, precipitated by the idea that life would be easier if we cut our losses, and almost always gave way to a several-day fight. I guess I was hard to live with back then.

Anyway, that phrase eventually started to infuriate me. One particular day, I snapped.

 

“...I just want you to be _happy_ , Alistair.” He sighed and rubbed a hand across his forehead, closing his eyes. He often did this—like it was _painful_ to look at me.

I took two steps closer. “What do you actually _mean_?” I asked.

That made him open his eyes. He lifted one eyebrow skeptically.

“Because that doesn’t sound like much of a concession,” I said. “In fact, it sounds like a _threat_ … like you would be _fine_ just going on without me.... and knowing that you would be fine in _that_ situation makes me the least happy of all.”

He grabbed his keys off the counter. “I’m done.”

I rolled my eyes and growled. At this point in our relationship, I’d seen this enough times to be frustrated instead of horrified. I chased him down the hallway toward the elevator.

“Anders, stop.”

He shook his head. “I’m not talking to you right now.”

“Well, fine!” I shouted. “ _I’m_ not chasing you this time.” The words felt empty when they occurred to me, but solidified in the air between us.

“Good! I don’t want you to!”

 

...and so began what I like to call ‘the period of silence.’ It lasted almost two weeks—the longest two weeks of my life. To be honest, I don’t even remember what the fight was _about_. Life is funny like that—the details fade away, but sometimes the feelings don’t. I remember the way my chest tightened and the feeling of the empty bed next to me in the morning more clearly than I can remember what I did _yesterday_.

Either way, I was alone—for two weeks—waiting for some sign that he would come back to me. At first, I didn’t call. I knew him; he _would_ come home.

By day four, though, I started to doubt my resolve. I sent him a text… then two… then some emails… a meme here and there… and pretty soon I was calling just to hear his voicemail.

It wasn’t until day thirteen that I heard the familiar sound of his keys in the lock. I ran to meet him at the door.

He didn’t say a word, just grabbed for me. It had been long enough that I didn’t fight.  In fact, that day taught me something: sometimes the silent treatment is the right one. It’s the dressing that heals a particular type of wound. It’s not my favorite, but neither is the underlying stuff that precipitates it: uncertainty, disbelief, doubt. And that’s the stuff that took us _years_ to work out.

 

“I _know_ you want me to be happy,” I said two hours later. It was the first sentence we uttered to each other, although we made a variety of _other_ sounds. “I just don’t like the implication that I would be happier _without_ you.”

He rolled his head toward me and managed to smile. “I understand.”

“Because, Anders?”

“Hmm?”

I moved so we were face to face, just a breath apart. “I _remember_ what that life was like… and it fucking sucked compared to this.”

He almost laughed.

“Are we okay?”

He nodded. “We’re okay.”

 

It wasn’t the last fight we had… _or_ the last time he held me at arm’s length… or even the last time he gave me the silent treatment… but he never said _that_ again. I _know_ he wants my happiness. He never has to say it.

* * *

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to @Aurlana for the once-over on this one. :)


End file.
